1. Technical Field of the Invention
This disclosure relates to information processing apparatus, information processing methods, and recording media storing a program therefor whereby operation candidates are presented based on an operation history when an operation is performed on an electronic file.
2. Description of the Related Art
In an apparatus referred to as a “multifunction peripheral,” a printer function, a scan function, a network function, and so on, are combined. In such a multifunction peripheral, image information obtained by scanning a document can be saved in a hard disk in the form of a file. The saved image information (to be referred to as an “image file”) can be later searched and a retrieved image file can be printed out or attached to electronic mail for transmission, for example.
However, the number of functions available on a multifunction peripheral has greatly increased, accompanied by an associated increase in the types of operations for performing those functions. As a result, users are faced with greater complexities in selecting various operations, due to an increase in the number of times buttons or the likes need to be pushed before a desired operation can be performed.
In order to solve the above problem, methods have been proposed whereby operations associated with functions with higher frequencies of use are presented, or an operation that has been performed just previously is presented. For example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2004-072563 discloses a method whereby operations are predicted and displayed on an image forming apparatus.
In this method, an operation is predicted and presented based on information about the frequency of use of operations associated with certain functions, or on user information indicating the type of user, such as an administrator. Thus, in such a conventional method, operations having higher frequencies of use by a user are presented, or a screen for selecting an operation customized for each type of user, such as an administrator or general users, is presented. By these methods, the burden accompanying an operation selection process can be reduced.
However, the above methods are disadvantages in the following respects. For example, in the case of the method based on the frequency of use of functions, the burden does not change for the selection of functions with less frequencies of use; indeed, the burden will more likely increase. Since users are likely to be less accustomed to operations associated with functions with less frequencies of use, these are actually the operations for which the burden on the user in connection with operation selection should rather be reduced. Not being able to support the users in this respect has remained a problem.
On the other hand, in the case of the method based on user types, it is necessary to prepare rules associating users with functions. Once associations between types of users and functions are set up as rules, it becomes necessary, if one or more of the associations have been changed over time, to examine the associations and update the rules, which may not be easy. Thus, the method is not suitable for situations where the functions used by certain types of users vary depending on circumstances.